Well if you want the L/R Mix in the center channel then I believe you will get that out of the "Music" setting in the FireWave setup. It's Pro logic II but it is in stereo. If you have all the speakers sitting in front of you, then you just need to play with the trim and dimension settings to equalize the output volume of each speaker.

This will give you the desired effect with out any other equipment, connections, software, or frustrations. I tried it out my self on my own FireWave, and it sounded pretty good.

My situation was similar to yours. Except I was connecting to different receivers on different sides of the room, with their own speakers. That's why I ditch my iMics and went with the FireWave. Either way the results should be the same. ;D

Well, ProLogic II is all fine and good (I use it on Music mode + Panorama all the time), but it doesn't evenly distribute all sounds to the surround speakers. For example, crowd noise would be louder in the surrounds than the lead vocals. It's cool, but not what I'm going for, although it seems I may not really have a choice.

Okay, so you can't setup 6 channel stereo with an external soundcard, but what about using optical out? I just bought a gently used Creative DDTS-100 so I can set up my Xbox and DVD player in my office. It has optical in (among other formats) and analog out, and does allow for simple passthrough, I believe. It encodes/decodes DTS (including Neo:6) and Dolby Digital (including ProLogic II Movie and Music modes), so it can replace the FireWave. Or: it has an analog switchbox, so I can keep the FireWave and use it in combination with the DDTS-100.

Just to get back to the point of this post, I want to know: using Apple's Audio MIDI Setup Utility, is it possible to configure 6 channel stereo using optical output?

I have decided to deep six the FireWave. The DDTS-100 encodes/decodes at higher quality. Unfortunately, I seem to have misplaced my optical cable, so I haven't been able to test what I asked about in my last post. However, the DTS Neo:6 Music mode seems to be pretty close to 6 channel stereo (unlike DD PLII), so I may just forget it.

Okay I think I found something of consequence. Okay you just want 2 channel stereo out of your 5.1 system. By this you mean you want the left channel to go to the left front and left rear, the right channel to got the the right front and right rear, and the center and sub to be whatever they come out as...

I think that's actually a little more complex than it looks, as it's advertised as creating "intense realism." But, as I said, I'm rockin' on DTS Neo:6, which is the next best thing to 6 channel stereo, and I have no complaints.

The optical audio connection is mostly amazing. I say mostly because, while it's amazingly clean and crisp, it's not without problems. My guess is that the MBP's soundcard just ain't doin' what it should.

Here's my problem: if there's a constant stream of audio to the decoder/speakers, it sounds great, but if that constant stream is stopped, the next sound to get transmitted gets cut short on the front end. This is especially annoying when it comes to quick sounds such as those I have set for instant messaging (Morse and Tink; the Tink actually gets cut completely). Is this because the optical laser is only switched on if there's sound being produced?

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